The Witcher 2 - Interview @ GameSpot

October 3rd, 2009, 08:50

GameSpot serves up the first Western interview with CD Projekt Red on The Witcher 2, although it's apparently too early for much new information . Adam Badowski provides the answers and here's a sample:

AB: Geralt will certainly be in the game, as we've all seen. I must admit we plan to build the story of The Witcher 2 around Geralt, but it's too early to reveal any more details.GS: There were some very interesting and very adult story themes in the original game—betrayal, sexuality, and bigotry. Will these themes be expanded in the sequel? What other themes with the sequel explore?AB: We want The Witcher 2 to be even more mature, so we'll be placing a lot of focus on the design of the story. Gamers will face a very real and brutal world. The way in which we explore sexuality will be greatly improved, and we'll be putting a lot of work into showing the erotic dimension of life in a more natural way, rather than as a sort of minigame. We'll be using cinematic means to flesh out characters, who will differ from each other as they would in real life. These differences will come through in their behavior, their attitude toward Geralt, and how they react to the world.
Once again, the game won't offer any choices between good and evil. Rather, it will force you to decide what is important to you and whom can you trust. Many times you'll be left with real doubts about the choices you've made because the consequences of your decisions will be unpredictable.

AB: We want The Witcher 2 to be even more mature, so we'll be placing a lot of focus on the design of the story. Gamers will face a very real and brutal world. The way in which we explore sexuality will be greatly improved, and we'll be putting a lot of work into showing the erotic dimension of life in a more natural way, rather than as a sort of minigame.

Thank you… a second run of endless debates about the card minigame would have been
too much to bear…

Once again, the game won't offer any choices between good and evil. Rather, it will force you to decide what is important to you and whom can you trust. Many times you'll be left with real doubts about the choices you've made because the consequences of your decisions will be unpredictable.

My problem in the first game was that the choices seemed meaningless, since there were equally bad results no matter what choice I made. OK, they wanted to make a "gritty" game, I guess. But with no choices between good and evil, picking a choice is basically just random, especially when all choices lead to the same basic results.

A player should have REASONS to pick one path or another (which is basically all that good vs evil are). I can see trying to make choices less simplistic, but not by making them meaningless. If I want to play as a good guy, that should be possible. I should have enough information - clues, at least - to pick the "best" choice as I see it, and to have that decision play out as a real difference.

And my problem with the card minigame was how sexually immature it was. I'd like to see a MATURE game, and something like that - clearly designed for (or by) randy 13-year-olds - was laughably immature. The nudity was fine (of course, here in America, a "wardrobe malfunction" seems to be considered worse than mass murder). But that ridiculous card minigame made me feel like I was playing a game designed strictly for adolescents. OK, I know games need to appeal to children, too, but couldn't we have something more adult for Witcher 2?

They will improve sex, that means instead of just collecting sex cards now we can play sex poker

I should have enough information - clues, at least - to pick the "best" choice as I see it

The best thing is that we cannot choose the best choice and we make mistakes thanks to that and that's what is beautiful about this game. I don't wanna see bioware style of choices in The Witcher where you know everything and just choose to be saint or evil.

Originally Posted by Daroou
Another interactive story game with some of those strange RPG things in it.

Sounds like it, but i wouldnt really call it interactive, it's really lacking that too.

The fact that you have really artificial "choices" is just lame (just like in Mass Effect). Create a game with real choices, the choice to go/climb/dive and explore where you want, which armors you want, choose which factions you want to join etc. That's when choices get interesting and most of all, fun.

Originally Posted by bemushroomed
Sounds like it, but i wouldnt really call it interactive, it's really lacking that too.

The fact that you have really artificial "choices" is just lame (just like in Mass Effect). Create a game with real choices, the choice to go/climb/dive and explore where you want, which armors you want, choose which factions you want to join etc. That's when choices get interesting and most of all, fun.

Did you even play The Witcher? How do you figure the choices were "artificial"? Unlike most games, some of the choices in The Witcher actually made a difference in the game later on.

well, its not like its some advanced ai behind it, it's just that a scripted event (A or B etc) will happen, i dont see the fun in that. Maybe its "fun" if you play it though numerous times (unfortunately the game is not THAT good) to see the different events or dialogues play out. Personally i don't care much for it. Story is the least interesting part in games imo, books and movies does it just so much better, in games i look for other things to entertain me (that books or movies cant have).

Create a game with real choices, the choice to go/climb/dive and explore where you want, which armors you want, choose which factions you want to join etc. That's when choices get interesting and most of all, fun.

bemushroomed: It sounds like you would rather play either a simplistic rpg like Oblivion or something that isn't an rpg. The story is a very important part of what makes an rpg and you can't remove that without making it something different. Look for a different genre if you don't want to play an rpg.

I'd say it a different way.. The story is important to an RPG but once it becomes so prominent in the game that it shadows the RPG elements, then it is more of an adventure game. I'd say Witcher 1 is perhaps just such a game because there is a strong emphasis on dialog and dialog choices. Maybe I didn't get far enough in the game to see the stronger RPG side of it, because I got bored with so much dialog.

I'd say Wither is a much more simplified way of playing RPG's.. Its not even a real RPG since you dont really have a choice of what character you want to be, you're a Witcher, the devs has decided that, not you.

I prefer RPG's like TES and FO3, those gives me limitless opportunities to roleplay basicly any kind of character i want and to really customize it the way i want, and to go and have my adventures exactly where i want.

Mods has made these games, almost, perfect, vanilla style i think they're just "ok" quite clearly they're more like base that you're supposed to build upon (so i'm not basing my experinces how these games are without mods).

In free roaming RPG's the story is what you do in the game, your own adventures and explorations. I dont need a developer to hold my hand throughout the whole game, or to say "sorry in this game you're a Witcher, so you can't use that weapon or wear that armor". That's just not what role playing is for me.

I've played my share of pen & paper RPG's too in my youth, fantastic experinces and the free roaming is much more similar to games like TES or FO3 than games like The Witcher which feels very limited to how the devs want it to be and play out. RP'ing shouldnt be streamlined like that.

It's nice to have a basic story, but really, the adventures and explorations YOU make in RPG's are often far, far more interesting and satisfying, because those kind of things are more unique. If i play e.g a Bioware game or The Witcher i'll have, basicly, 90% the same adventure/exploration experience as anyone else playing the game, that's boring. It's almost like reading a book :/ and that's not what RP'ing is all about.

I'd say Wither is a much more simplified way of playing RPG's.. Its not even a real RPG since you dont really have a choice of what character you want to be, you're a Witcher, the devs has decided that, not you.

I prefer more advanced RPG's like TES and FO3, those gives me limitless opportunities to roleplay basicly any kind of character i want at to really customize it the way i want.

In a free roaming RPG's the story is what you do in the game, your own adventures and explorations. I dont need a developer to hold my hand throughout the whole game, or to say "sorry in this game you're a Witcher, so you can't use that weapon or wear that armor". That's just not what role playing is for me.

We just have totally different idea what cRPG is. In my opinion Fallout 3 and Oblivion barely can be called cRPGs and should be called action games with cRPG elements. The Witcher, Bloodlines, Planescape Torment etc are the 'true' cRPGs. You just think the other way and there is nothing we can discuss I guess, none of us will change his minds.

I'd say Wither is a much more simplified way of playing RPG's.. Its not even a real RPG since you dont really have a choice of what character you want to be, you're a Witcher, the devs has decided that, not you.

I prefer more advanced RPG's like TES and FO3, those gives me limitless opportunities to roleplay basicly any kind of character i want and to really customize it the way i want.

On the other hand, free-roaming RPG's like Diablo, TES and FO3 are necessarily and fundamentally much simpler in other ways. The quests are short, simple, and relatively mechanical, and most of the interest comes from exploring the map and developing your character mechanics, rather than advancing a story or developing you're character's character. Trying to combine good narrative with an open environment is really hard, and IMO only Fallout 1 has ever really succeeded in it.

In a free roaming RPG's the story is what you do in the game, your own adventures and explorations.

Which, since the "DM" is a computer, are necessarily simple, usually focused on "bring X to Y" or "kill Z" or other relatively mechanical tasks, even if they're sometimes dressed up in a bit of story.

I dont need a developer to hold my hand throughout the whole game, or to say "sorry in this game you're a Witcher, so you can't use that weapon or wear that armor". That's just not what role playing is for me. I've played my share of pen & paper RPG's too in my youth, fantastic experinces and the free roaming is much more similar to games like TES or FO3 than games like The Witcher which feels very limited to how the devs want it to be and play-out.

OTOH I've played — and led — pen and paper RPG's where the DM gives quite tight constraints to the player characters — sometimes just as tight as the ones in The Witcher. Hell, classic PnP D&D modules are as linear and constrained as they come, narratively speaking.

It's nice to have a basic story, but really, the adventures and explorations YOU make in RPG's are often far, far more interesting and satisfying, because those kind of things are totally unique! If i play e.g a Bioware game or The Withcher game i'll have basicly 90% the same adventure as anyone else, that's boring. It's almost like reading a book :/ That's not RP.

Except that many BioWare games, and The Witcher, have branching stories. That means that you won't have 90% the same adventure as everyone else, with one play-through. It'll be maybe 40% the same. This is maybe a bit more than one play-through of Morrowind, but even in that, the main questline — which has had most attention lavished on it — will be the same as everyone else's.

What's more, in the games you listed, the main questline is usually perfectly linear — much more so than in the games you don't like because you feel they railroad you into doing stuff. In them, the non-linearity just means doing the same things in a different order, or stepping out of the main questline for a while to do sidequests, before coming back to it.

IOW, all of your messages on this thread boil down to a real simple statement:

That's totally OK, but it *is* entirely a matter of personal opinion. From that to calling games that have more complex narratives and less exploration "action-adventures" or "not RPG's" is a quite a leap. What's more, you're very lucky in that there are far more free-roaming games with simple, mechanical quests and no narrative out there than there are narrative-heavy, more constrained games.

So I'll finish up by asking you the same question I usually ask in threads like this: why do you care? The Witcher, Alpha Protocol, and Venetica are almost certainly not your kind of games. On the other hand, Risen, Dragon Age, and Diablo 3 probably are. So why are you even on this thread?

A good DM will make sure you'll get a personal, unique and fun experience. Sounds like you had a boring DM.

I'd say the questing is just as mechanical in The Witcher or in a Bioware game, just with, sometimes, a bit better dialogue and sometimes more interesting characters, i'll give them that

Dragon Age (linear like usual with Bioware, i bet?) and Diablo (never appealed to me, extremely limited games when it comes to roleplaying and exploring) are totally uninteresting to me.

From what i've heard of a friend that finished ME 2 times, he said the experience was very unsatisfying and didn't really feel any different, i've read the same on different forums. Could be that Witcher is way better in that regard, i havent played it though several times so i couldnt say.

Could be that games like TES and FO3 requires a bit more of the player in regards to imagination, i make up my own stories, background and purposes, that's closer to how P&P RP's were for me - very personal and unique. That doesnt really work in a RPG like The Witcher because how streamlined it is to give you a certain experience that the devs has decided.

Why i am in this thread? It's a forum, we disscuss stuff we feel strongly for? If you want a forum where everyone thinks the same go to the offical forum, im pretty positive you'll find that 99% of the people there are fan boys and would rahter die than to criticize something. It's not any different on the TES forums.

edit: oh, a question about the branching story lines in the witcher, will it have any _real_ and even visisble impact or is it just in the dialogue? I mean like if you choose one path a whole city will be in ruins while if you take another it will flourish, and you will see this graphically?

A good DM will make sure you'll get a personal, unique and fun experience. Sounds like you had a boring DM.

Well, probably, since I *was* the boring DM, most of the time. Still, my players keep coming back, for over ten years now with this group.

It can be personal, unique, and fun *without* being completely unconstrained. The thing is that the more you constrain the characters, the better you can connect them to the world, and the more meaningful the conflicts, problems, and other situations can be. From there on out, it's up to them to deal with them as they see fit.

For example, my current campaign is centered around the magistrate of a small village in an outlying district of something that's uncannily like mythical China. I set a quite a few parameters for this character — he's a he, a noble, has a background in the civil service, has studied law, comes from a minor family in a certain amount of economic difficulties, that sort of thing. However, how he deals with problems in Three Hills is entirely up to him and his associates.

Of course, in a story-heavy computer game things have to be somewhat more constrained simply because a computer can't improvise very well — but overall this structure isn't that different from The Witcher's — you were handed a character to play with, and then it was up to you to make of him what you will.

I'd say the questing is just as mechanical in The Witcher or in a Bioware game, just with, sometimes, a bit better dialogue and sometimes more interesting characters, i'll give them that

Except that in The Witcher and BioWare games, quests often have multiple different outcomes, they affect each other, and they affect the overarching storyline. This is the diametrical opposite of the TES way of having every quest or questline in a completely independent bubble.

Dragon Age (linear like usual with Bioware, i bet?) and Diablo (never appealed to me, extremely limited games when it comes to roleplaying and exploring) are totally uninteresting to me.

I understand that Dragon Age will have a pretty big and open world that you can explore at your leisure.

From what i've heard of a friend that finished ME 2 times, he said the experience was very unsatisfying and didn't really feel any different, i've read the same on different forums. Could be that Witcher is way better in that regard, i havent played it though several times so i couldnt say.

Mass Effect was very unsatisfying in most ways, and a big let-down for me at least. The Witcher wasn't; I played that through three times with different choices each time, and the differences were big enough that the experience was fresh every time.

Could be that games like TES and FO3 requires a bit more of the player in regards to imagination, i make up my own stories, background and purposes, that's closer to how P&P RP's were for me - very personal and unique. That doesnt really work in a RPG like The Witcher because how streamlined it is to give you a certain experience that the devs has decided.

That's quite likely the reason you prefer open-world, unconstrained game designs. Nothing wrong with that, as I said — but that doesn't make more constrained, more story-driven designs less RPG. The opportunities for role-playing are just different: your actions have a real effect on the surrounding world; they *mean* something to other characters in the game. In TES-style open-world designs, the only actions that make any difference to anyone else are the ones on the main quest, which, as I said, is even more linear than in the ones you're citing.

Why i am in this thread? It's a forum, we disscuss stuff we feel strongly for?

Exactly — and since you don't care about The Witcher, why discuss it here?

If you want a forum where everyone thinks the same go to the offical forum, im pretty positive you'll find that 99% of the people there are fan boys and would rahter die than to criticize something. It's not any different on the TES forums.

Criticizing flaws in something you like and are interested in is one thing. Dissing something because you don't like the whole concept is another. There's a reason I don't hang out on Oblivion forums, or discuss Oblivion here on Oblivion threads, and the reason is that I dislike the entire concept. I do sometimes bring it up on threads about other games as an example of how not to do things, of course, but that, again, is a bit different.